Archive for August, 2011

Yesterday Alan and I had the awesome opportunity to get a preview of this year’s Buskerfest downtown at The St. Lawrence Market!

Buskerfest, as you can tell by the name, is a festival where buskers from all over the world come to show off what they can do! Buskerball is a charity event in support of epilepsy (which I find weird as I don’t support epilepsy, I’m donating to get rid of epilepsy) and it lets ticket holders see some of the best acts before everyone else gets to see them, eat and drink some great food and participate in both a silent and live auction.

Alan and I got to dress up, drink free wine and be charitable! FUN!!!

We got to see women who can fit into a small box with a basketball (this was my third time watching her, she’s Australian and oh-so-charming!):

We saw a guy swallow himself up in a giant balloon:

This guy was ridiculous and made me want to go home and work out for three hours! This picture is NOT in mid twirl or anything, he held himself in that position for an absurd amount of time! He flung himself around that pole like a hardcore stripper!

These guys were awesome! A comedic acrobatic troupe dressed up like the guys in Hot Rod and even used pogo sticks!

The last act of the evening was outside for the fire eaters! AWESOME!

Alan and I had a ball (heh, pun intended). I love buskers!!! There are some amazing acts this year and I encourage everyone to head down to The St. Lawrence Market this weekend to see these incredible acts and more!

Indian Night

Tonight was Indian night! Dinner (courtesy again of Chef Jeff ) was Palak Paneer! I accidentally forgot to add the spices when called to (at the beginning, like most Indian dishes) and added them at the end so I think it might be even more flavourful if you do it properly but this was a pretty decent dish (and got two thumbs up from Alan as well). Super simple to make and not incredibly spicy so it’s a nice dish to ease the family into Indian! I paired it with mushroom bhaji and some brown rice! I am going to bed a happy camper!

Have you gotten your copy of Chef Jeff’s e-cookbook yet? Get it now because the price is going up to $27 soon!

No, I didn’t do anything ridiculously exciting but it was just one of those fabulous days that leaves you heading to bed with a smile on your face.

First thing, guess what came in the mail today?!

My prize from The Great Fundraising Act!!! I’ve been impatiently all month for this to arrive and today was the day (with a great big green sticker around the side saying that the border snooped through it…)! I won Paige‘s donation which was a “fitness on the go” kit containing all you need to keep fit and healthy on the road! I was like a kid at Christmas when the post woman knocked on the door and teared into that sucker with glee! Nike dri-fit socks are da bomb, by the way (yes, I said “da bomb”)! I own three pairs and love, love, LOVE them so I was pretty happy to get yet another pair!

Aside from that, Alan and I took a wee walk this morning and finally got our library cards!!! Both of us love to read but now that we’re trying to budget more, buying books is a luxury we can’t afford so we got our cards and split up to find something to read. I came home with The Tiger’s Wife by Tea Obreht!

I’ve seen this book around and have heard about it but never actually picked it up before. I think I was more intrigued by the fact that it was written by a girl six years younger than me but is winning all of these literary awards than for the content of the book itself! But I’m already 80 pages in and now completely understand! What a writer! It’s hard to believe she’s only 26 years old! Her writing style feels much more like she’s been around the block a few times. So glad I picked it up! *sigh* Libraries. Best invention EVER!

Finally, I actually have FOOD to share with you today! *gasp* I know. It’s been forever and for that I apologize but I just have not been up to cooking much at all this summer, not to mention our knives were getting dangerously dull (thankfully we bought a great sharpener last week and I feel better about preparing our veggies again). But now that the summer is winding down and both Alan and I are wanting to make more of an effort to shed some pounds, I started meal planning again.

This week’s meals are special though because at least one dish every night this week (except for Tuesday as Alan and I have a function), will be from a new e-cookbook called DinneRevolution by Chef Jeff! Chef Jeff contacted me last week to give me a preliminary copy of his e-cookbook and it couldn’t be more timely. He has structured this cookbook around families who want healthy meals, fast. Each meal takes less than 30 minutes to make and has only a few ingredients. He also includes the nutritional stats for each dish! Pretty cool, eh? I thought this was perfect to kick off our first week at slimming down together.

Tonight I made the Linguini with Sun-Dried Tomato Sauce! Yum!

This was a pretty great dish, I have to say! I know I put a bit more sun-dried tomatoes than called for but that’s because I adore sun-dried tomatoes. Regardless, this was a fast and simple dish that went down well! It’s actually slightly sweet but the saltiness from the sun-dried tomatoes evens it out (there’s no other added salt in this dish at all). I paired it with some big slices of grilled eggplant and the whole meal was gone in about five minutes flat!

I highly recommend trying this dish and to help you out, Chef Jeff is giving away copies of his cookbook to all of you! If click here all you have to do is sign up and you’ll get yourself a copy! How awesome is that?! This is not a strictly vegetarian cookbook, by the way, he has several categories that also feature all types of meat as well as seafood but I’ll be featuring his vegetarian options throughout the week and give you my honest opinion on them!

So can you tell why I’ve had a pretty great day today? Great prizes, great books and great food! Now I’m off to hopefully make it even better by watching Season 1, Episode 1 of Mad Men! Yes! I’m finally getting around to watching it! So excited!

What made your day great today?! Do you watch Mad Men? Do you love it?!